The Food Plain Issue

The Group recently registered objection to Paragraphs 2.1.43 - 2.1 45 of the Finalised Local Plan, based principally on the importance of the site as part of the natural flood plain.

This was graphically illustrated during the evening of Wednesday 26th April when the River North Esk rose to within some 18 inches of the road bridge at Polton Village. This was the result of consistent moderate rainfall over almost all of the previous 48-hour period. It took the form of a series of surges, which caused quite rapid rises in the river level. During the last of these, shortly before 8pm, the river flooded a considerable portion of the mill site which behaved just as nature intended and absorbed a quantity of water which was then released back into the river relatively slowly. If this had not happened then there may well have been flooding in Polton Village itself. As it was, the beneficial action of the flood plain was somewhat diminished by the bund of rubble which had previously been placed alongside the river channel at the northwest corner of the site. This illustrated quite clearly the danger, which could be caused by the erection of any bund that might be thought necessary to protect new housing on the Springfield Mill site. The advice of the professional hydrologist has always been that the flood plain should be left as clear as possible and that no constrictions should be placed along the water channel.

The flood plain performs two principle functions. The first is to act as a buffer against sudden surges in the river, which it did successfully, albeit it in a relatively minor way on the evening of 26th April. The second is to allow the river to find its way around any serious sand-fall off Hewan Bank. Although many thousands of tons of sand were washed off the bank, as witnessed by the large deposits between Polton and Kevock Steps, there was no single catastrophic fall. What did happen, however, was significant erosion of the bottom of the bank. It is quite clear that the whole east face of Hewan Bank has changed its profile and the lower parts are now much more vertical than they were before. It is well known that the bank will eventually come down, perhaps over several hundred more years, but the probability of a large sand-fall in the near future is now much greater.

Dramatic as the events of 26th April were to those who witnessed them, we were lucky. There was no catastrophic sandfall off Hewan Bank, and the rains, although consistently heavy over a long period, were at no time what could be considered torrential. If either of these things was to happen in the future and the flood plain had at best not been restored, and at worst further interfered with, then lives as well as properties would be at risk.

There has been much public discussion recently on the long-term dangers of building on or otherwise interfering with natural flood plains. The Springfield Mill site is a relatively small flood plain protecting a relatively small area. Nevertheless it is no less important to the protection of that area which includes existing communities, and this was clearly demonstrated on 26th April. We submit that the flood plain can be restored to its natural level by demolishing the remaining mill buildings and the appropriate re-arranging of rubble, but to allow further building on the site would ignore the safety of the downstream communities and therefore be totally irresponsible.